Grimm Returns And Dracula Arrives To Put Some Bite In Friday Night At NBC

Thank Grimm it’s Friday! Also thank Dracula, as NBC has made the wise choice to pair their newest drama series with Grimm, creating a two-hour block of supernatural fun for TV viewers who like their drama with a bit of bite in it. Grimm returns for its third season tonight at 9:00 p.m. ET, after which Dracula makes its grand debut at 10:00 p.m. on NBC.

For those who need a refresher course on where things left off at the end of Grimm’s second season, we break it all down for you here, along with some mildly spoilery tidbits about what the first two episodes have to offer.

Watch the clip below to see what Nick’s friends are up to at the start of tonight’s Season 3 premiere:

And then there’s Dracula, the new period drama from Daniel Knauf, Tony Krantz, Colin Callender and Gareth Neame, which stars Jonathan Rhys Meyers as the title character, who returns to London in the late 19th century, posing as an American entrepreneur named Alexander Grayson. While Grayson attempts to infiltrate Victorian society, he’s also looking to bring modern science to the people in the form of wireless electricity. And then of course, there’s the big secret he’s keeping from people, which is, of course, that he’s a vampire. The story takes some complex turns from there, involving vampire huntsmen, Dracula’s plot for revenge on the people who cursed him with immortality, and his complicated relationship with Van Helsing. Dracula also finds himself drawn to a woman who looks remarkably like his deceased wife.

From the first few episodes of the series, it looks like Dracula aims to be a slow-boil kind of drama, which is kind of refreshing by comparison to some of the network TV serialized dramas that try too hard at the beginning and stumble all over themselves when it comes time to develop the story further. Dracula finds a nice pace from the beginning and sticks with that in the episodes that follow, slowly unfolding Dracula’s back-story with his current state of affairs. The series is intriguing, not to mention nice to look at, between the series' pretty costumes and equally pretty cast.

With that said, I’ve never read Bram Stoker’s Dracula, so in terms of the adaptation of this iconic dark character, I can’t offer much insight in the way of comparison. I do like Meyers’ portrayal of the role for NBC’s series, however, as I think he manages to play up Grayson’s charm and Dracula’s predatory side without delving into unnecessary theatrics. Given the nature of the character, I think that’s a notable feat. I’m not sure I’m as drawn in by the series as I wanted to be by Episode 4, and there’s a lot going on in the story. But as a way to cap off Grimm on Friday nights, Dracula seems like it could be a good fit, and I plan to stick with it for a little while to see where this story is going.